During the 2ndInternational Workshop on Creativity in Requirements Engineering (CREARE’12, Essen, Germany), we showcased how improv can be used as an experience-based design technique. Better than words, the video:

In the related paper we present the expected strengths of using improv as a design technique in RE:

Improv supports collaborative creativity: improv as we use it can be seen as mechanism to create novel, unexpected stories from diverging raw material, and adapts well to stakeholders groups. Interaction between players, and between the audience and the players, is key to improv.

Improv is quick and cheap: given the cost of N people locked in a meeting room, improv’s immediacy makes it a very cheap tool compared to other slower techniques.

Improv is flexible: the lack of fixed recording media makes it for a total flexibility, while video recording and a-posteriori editing remains possible.

Improv is intuition-based: improv taps into your intuition to build stories. This neglected idea source complements well with more rational moments in your creative process.

Improv is experience-centred: the focus is not on the designed product, but on the user experience around it.

Improv enables a high degree of representation: actors playing can say much more than a UML diagram or a list of actions in a process diagram, or a drawn storyboard. Emotions in particular are naturally represented.